5 Pro-Marijuana Arguments That Aren't Helping

I have a lot of friends and family who smoke pot, and the majority of them are pretty vocal about wanting it legalized. Let me make perfectly clear right off the bat that I'm not coming at this as an "anti-pot" guy because I personally don't give a shit if they legalize it, and it doesn't bother me that people smoke. I've done my share of illegal substances.

But goddamn are pot advocates some of the most annoying fucking people on the planet. I'm not talking about the average Joe who just wishes it were legal. Hell, those people are inching into the majority and comprise a significant portion of our own audience. I'm talking about the people who push it so hard that they're just short of going door to door, like Mormons. And they get so aggressive and misguided in their arguments that I'm pretty sure that they are their own worst enemy at this point.

GettyI take this guy totally, 100% seriously.

I'm at the stage where I cringe every time I hear...

Taxing it Will Save the Economy!

This one seems to be the dominant argument ever since the economy went to shit. "Legalize it and tax it! With all the money we'll save from enforcement and all the tax money we'll take in, it'll balance the budget!" And no, I'm not exaggerating the claims -- here's one of the more articulate articles that literally says marijuana would "save the economy."

"Look, up in the sky!" "...what?"

He cites some pretty big numbers. "Full legalization would bring in [...] $6.2bn annually if it were taxed at rates similar to those on alcohol and tobacco." Man, that's a lot! But when you put that up beside the total taxes collected in 2010 ($2.1 trillion) and the current national debt ($14.4 trillion), the dent it makes is comparable to trying to change the orbit of the Sun by shooting it with your BB gun.

There's no doubt that legalization would create some jobs and bring in some tax revenue. But it's a drop in the bucket, and when you start presenting that drop with titles like (as in the wake of the Prop 19 legalization movement in California last year) "Save California: Legalize Marijuana" and "To Save California, Legalize Pot", it makes it sound like you have no fucking idea what you are talking about. In fact, it makes it sound like a bunch of young stoners making shit up, and that gives opponents an excuse to dismiss everything else you're saying.

It's the same when the advocates say that we'd be able to "fix the budget" by eliminating the cost of marijuana-related law enforcement, based on this insane idea that once the drug is legal, we'd no longer need any of that. As if the country would suddenly turn into a free-for-all, grow-your-own, weedathon where there are no regulations or restrictions on its production, and yet everyone would just volunteer to report and pay the $50 per ounce tax out of a sense of civic duty. Why? Because people prefer to do things the legal way? That's true... because they fear going to jail. Which means you still fucking have to pay for cops to investigate and arrest people who use unauthorized pot.

This is what opponents were trying to explain during the California legalization debate, that you're going to need a shitload of new regulations to figure out just exactly what activity you're legalizing, and what happens to the people who violate the new laws. Do you get the FDA involved in regulating the THC content? So then you need somebody enforcing those regulations, right? And to go after the stronger, black market stuff? Then we'd still have DUI arrests to deal with, and figuring out what weed does to your health insurance premiums, etc.

Again, let me make clear that whether it's legalized or not, my life doesn't change. I couldn't give less of a shit. It's the dishonesty of the arguments themselves, and the way you're absolutely bludgeoned with these on the internet, that I find infuriating. And none piss me off more than...

We Need it for Cancer Patients! And to Make Paper!

This is a tactic used by almost every advocate I've ever met. See, they don't want to legalize pot because they want to smoke it and get high. No, they're only concerned on behalf of cancer patients. And they'll have martyrs they can pull out as examples, like that guy who was fired for using medical marijuana on the job. That's what legalization is really about, right, TokeOfTheTown.com?

I hear both arguments from friends constantly, and not a goddamn fucking one of them has cancer. None of them has ever had a need for, nor owned a rope. And before they started reading "facts" off of a pro-weed website, not one of them thought twice about the paper industry. It's a bullshit, back-door argument. And, again, it makes everything they say seem invalid -- the same as when states that do legalize for medicinal use immediately see half of the patients use it, not for cancer, but mysterious "chronic pain" or "stress relief." In other words, they lie so they can get medicinal weed, not caring that it makes the entire campaign seem like a lie.

GettyYep, you're a far less healthy person without marijuana. It is the only medication that can treat your obviously debilitating disease.

People want to get high, and I just wish they'd come out and say it. Of all the arguments I've ever heard, I've never had a solitary person step up and just say with unmasked honesty, "I want to get stoned without the fear of being arrested." Which is ironic to me because it's the only argument I've ever heard that makes sense. It's the only one that's even remotely logical.

Putting up this front that weed is a magical cure for all things economic not only requires you to bend the truth beyond recognition, but makes it seem like you're admitting that simply wanting to get high is not a valid reason to make it legal. In fact, the cancer patients who do in fact benefit from it wind up becoming the victims of your bullshit. When a perfectly healthy guy with dreadlocks and cannabis leaf t-shirts stands up next to the cancer patient and pretends the interests of the cancer patient are all he has in mind, it makes it look like both of them are full of shit.

GettyTake that, cancer!

It's Good for You!

So the picture I'm starting to get is that pot advocates saw the government's old, ridiculous anti-weed propaganda that grossly exaggerated the harm of the drug and decided that the best way to combat that was to simply tell equally silly lies in the opposite direction. So in my lifetime I've seen the argument go from "pot isn't as bad as other illegal drugs" to "it doesn't hurt you" to literally saying weed is "good for you." You know, like it's Vitamin C or calcium.

Via Cape Cod TodayHell, he's doing those other people a favor by giving them a contact health boost!

But again, I'm not trying to fall back to the government's "one joint will drive you insane" scaremongering. Pot is not as bad as heroin. That isn't my point. But don't go the other way and start acting like the shit is fucking broccoli.